Is Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 a live service game? It’s not normally referred to as such, despite receiving a steady stream of updates that fuel repeated multiplayer play. There are free updates, big patches, and season passes packed with new cosmetics. Space Marine 2 launched in September 2024, but it’s still going strong, and a lot of that has to do with the way developer Saber Interactive continues to update the game. But still, it’s not thought of as a live service game.
Live service has become something of a dirty word in the video game industry. It’s what the disastrous Concord was, what the ill-fated Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League was, and what Highguard never got the chance to be. Space Marine 2, however, has yet to be tarnished by the same brush.
In an interview with IGN, Tim Willits, chief creative officer of Saber Interactive, said that there isn’t a perfect term to describe Space Marine 2, because the term ‘live service’ has come to mean aggressive microtransactions, and that’s not what the game is about.
“So one thing that I think that Saber’s done well is that we respect our players, we support our games through amazing free updates, and then also big paid updates,” Willits said. “But we don’t nickel-and-dime people to death. And I think that they’re like, ‘Multiplayer games that are supported over the long…’ I don’t know if there’s really a term for that.
“So I don’t want to say live service game, because when you think of a live service game, you think about buying individual items. But we do support our games as long as they’re feasible to support.”
There’s certainly truth in Willits’ words here. Saber just released a big update that added Space Marine 2’s first new playable class, the Techmarine, for free, alongside a new PvE map, also for free. Further free updates are set out to the end of June.
But we should also point out that there is plenty of paid DLC available for Space Marine 2. Over $100 worth of DLC, divided up into various cosmetics packs that let fans play as some of the most famous Space Marine chapters in the setting. Then there is the Season Pass itself. All this DLC is for show. It does not affect gameplay.
There is an outlier, however: Space Marine 2’s first Chapter Voice Pack. The recently released $4.99 DLC sparked Space Marine 2’s first proper backlash, with some even accusing Saber of false advertising (IGN has asked publisher Focus Entertainment for comment but it has yet to respond). The DLC has an ‘overwhelmingly negative’ user review rating on Steam.
We asked Willits about the backlash, but he didn’t offer much in response. “I don’t know. I thought it was cool,” he said. “We’ll see how it is. I mean, I don’t really have much to say on that.”
I suspect this voice pack will be a learning experience for Focus and Saber, and I suspect subsequent voice packs (there will surely be more) will have to improve their offering in order to keep players on-side. It’s hardly evidence of a change of heart, of the start of a new, aggressive monetization policy for Space Marine 2, but it does veer into the sort of live service territory Willits wants to avoid.
Through all this is a question bubbling under the surface of the Space Marine 2 community: that the priority now is the development of Space Marine 3, announced in quick fashion after the record-breaking launch of Space Marine 2. The suggestion is Space Marine 2 support will suffer as a result of Saber having to also throw resources at Space Marine 3. This is something Saber has denied is the case before, and Willits denied it again in our interview.
“No, we actually just released a big update and it’s still going strong,” Willits said, referring to the Techmarine update. “Were we at number four on the top sales? So it’s still doing great for us. And we just released a big update. And like World War Z, we’re still making content for that, while the team obviously works on Space Marine 3.”
Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
